


A Tad Anemic

by Calculatrice



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Dialogue Heavy, Humor, M/M, Nocturnality, Winter Troupe 3rd Play, kind of furanono pre-slash if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-22
Updated: 2020-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:09:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26604244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calculatrice/pseuds/Calculatrice
Summary: “Oh, come on,” the figure at Nonomiya’s table groans. “Seriously? We’re doing this?”Out of the many things Kota might have expected to see, the vampire that saved Reo’s life was not one of them.“You brought this on yourself,” Nonomiya snaps. “I can’tbelieveyou didn’t say anything sooner.”(In which Kota finally finds a lead on his missing roommate in the last place he could ever expect.)
Relationships: Franz & Nonomiya, Kutou Reo/Seo Kouta, Seo Kouta & Nonomiya, Takatoo Tasuku/Yukishiro Azuma
Comments: 14
Kudos: 54





	A Tad Anemic

**Author's Note:**

> a little more inspired by the stage play, where Franz and Reo are hinted to have already known each other a while. also, for the sake of my sanity, Nono and Franz never caught a glimpse of each other in the play.

“Seo.”

“What,” Kota throws, not looking away from his screen.

The problem, Kota thinks, with trying to find where a vampire might have gone, is that he can’t really judge where a vampire _wouldn’t_ have gone. Aside from ‘not back to Kota’s place.’ It’s a research endeavour that gets worse the more time he pours into it. 

“Do you mind coming with me after work?”

Not that he’s going to _stop_ pouring time into it. He grimaces. “Can we do another day?”

“No.”

 _That_ makes him look up, to where Nonomiya’s standing over his desk, arms crossed. Kota blinks, struck by the dark circles under his friend’s eyes (drinking habits aside, Nonomiya _does_ try his best to get his sleep), the harried tapping of his finger on his elbow, the unhappy purse of his mouth.

And he feels a twinge of guilt—when was the last time he’d talked to him properly?

“Sorry,” he offers, pulling up what he hopes is a placating smile. “Yeah, I’ll come. To the usual bar?”

“No,” says Nonomiya again, though he seems to relax a little at Kota’s assent. “To mine.”

Kota raises his eyebrows. “Sure? Is everything alright?”

“No.” Nonomiya scrunches his nose. “But, later.”

He walks away before Kota can say anything else, leaving him to stare bemusedly after him. Taking a deep breath, Kota rolls his shoulders. He’s not getting any closer to Reo—he might as well take the break.

.

.

This is not a break.

“Oh, come on,” the figure at Nonomiya’s table groans. “Seriously? We’re doing this?”

Out of the many things Kota might have expected to see, the vampire that saved Reo’s life was not one of them.

“You brought this on yourself,” Nonomiya snaps. “I can’t _believe_ you didn’t say anything sooner.”

“It’s not as if I even knew until I saw the—”

“Where’s Reo?” Kota cuts in. 

“None of my business,” the vampire snips. “Also, hello, my name is Franz, which you might have known if you’d asked—”

Nonomiya slaps a hand to his face and, as the surrealness of the situation finally begins to set in, Kota rounds on him.

“What’s going on?” He shoves a finger in the vampire— _Franz_ ’s direction. “How the hell do you know him?”

“I don’t!” Nonomiya drops his hand, squaring his shoulders with an indignant look. “All I know is that he’s a pain, apparently knows you _and_ your secret vampire roommate you never told me about, which I would never have known if he didn’t see one of our pictures and go, _oh, it’s Reo’s blood supply,_ which, what the fuck?”

“I wasn’t his _blood supply,_ ” Kota glares at Franz, who only shrugs, before turning back to his friend. “I told you a million times, I was helping him get back on his feet, not joining a cult.”

“So the fact that you didn’t even _know_ makes this so much better?” Nonomiya’s voice goes shrill. “I kept _saying,_ your freeloader looks suspicious as hell, Seo. Get him out of your house already, Seo. There are shelters for this kind of thing, _Seo—_ ”

“And I told you there was nothing to worry about, and that’s a cold-blooded move—”

“—but you didn’t listen to me, and I had to surmise from some stranger that the reason you were passed out until midday was severe _blood-drinking-induced_ anemia—”

“—and he didn’t have any bad intentions, and even ended up getting hurt for me.”

Nonomiya pauses mid-rant, brows furrowed in suspicion. “What hurts a vampire?”

“That would be the exorcist, wouldn’t it?” Franz pipes, chin in his hands and amused smile curving his mouth. “Or maybe you’d prefer, vampire-hunting cultist?”

Nonomiya opens his mouth. Shuts his mouth. Closes his eyes. Pinches the bridge of his nose. Takes a breath. 

“The fucking _what._ ”

“It’s not his fault that he’s being hunted by lunatics for existing,” snaps Kota impatiently. “Besides, if you know so much better, why the hell is _he_ in your apartment?”

Nonomiya rears back, a flash of shock passing over his face, before it screws up again in frustration. “Isn’t it _obviously_ because of you!” 

There’s a loud click from the kettle on the counter which startles both of them but makes Franz perk up, rushing over to fill three dry noodle-cups with boiling water. Perhaps feeling their eyes on him, he peeks over his shoulder and narrows his eyes at them.

“All of these are mine.”

Slowly turning back to face Kota, Nonomiya visibly deflates. “I helped him out two weeks back, and found out about the connection a few days ago. And I still— you’re looking for him, aren’t you? I want to help.”

Kota frowns. “You don’t think anything of Reo.”

“Obviously not. And I think even less now that I know he was taking your blood in your sleep—”

“You gotta do what you gotta do,” Franz interjects. 

“—but you’re not gonna give up on meeting him, so...”

“No, I’m not,” Kota agrees, crossing his arms.

Nonomiya shrugs uncomfortably, before waving a hand over to the vampire at his kitchen table. 

And as Kota watches Franz snap open a pair of disposable chopsticks, he feels it finally strike. This is his first lead in months. He might actually be able to find Reo again.

_He could see Reo again._

“I want no part in this,” says Franz, and Nonomiya’s eyebrow twitches. 

“You’re involved whether you like it or not,” he says sharply.

Kota glances back at him, startled, and this clicks too—for all his bluster and disapproval, Nonomiya still dragged said lead into his own apartment for him to confront. And suddenly, the argument couldn’t matter less.

“Exactly.” More gently, he says, “thanks, Nonomiya.”

And Nonomiya looks stunned for a moment, before finally relaxing into a relieved smile. “Let’s sit down?”

Kota agrees, but he’s hit with another punch of surrealism when they join Franz, who slurps noodles with a thoroughly put-out look.

“I thought vampires couldn’t eat?” He blurts, thinking of days and nights of Reo refusing food, of niggling worry twining with suspicion. Even now Kota can remember the way he scrunched his nose at being offered breakfast, and yet his smile whenever Kota complimented his cooking—

“We can’t subsist on it,” Franz inclines his head. “Some of it still tastes the same. Feels gross later, though.” Perhaps seeing the question in his eyes, he goes on, “Reo stopped seeing a point in it when he became set on being a martyr.”

“I… see,” says Kota, stomach sinking. Had spending meals with him been some form of self-punishment? “Is he okay, still? The wound, it’s not lingering?”

Franz waves a dismissive hand. “He’s fine. He did himself many favours by over-drinking.”

There’s a pause. 

“Over-drinking?” Nonomiya asks, voice almost excessively neutral.

“How much blood do you think we can really stomach at once?” Franz snorts. “Call it binge-eating, as it was probably out of stress—” 

Nonomiya props his elbows on the table to drop his face into his palms, effectively hiding whatever horrified expression Kota imagines is on it.

“—but his usual amount would have only made someone like _you,_ ” Franz’s mouth stretches into a leer, “at most a _tad_ anemic.”

Kota wonders if it should be worrying that his immediate thought is, _good, he can’t use this as an argument not to come back._

He decides that it’s not. 

“So where is he now?”

“Didn’t I say that it’s not my business?” Franz puts down his empty cup and picks up the next in one smooth gesture. “And even if I knew, why would I tell _you_ , the person he’s running from? Not that I understand why he would turn down a perfectly willing meal.” 

At this, he gazes mournfully at Nonomiya. 

“Look away, Franz,” he clips dryly. “I’m not giving you my blood.”

“Yet,” the vampire mutters. 

Kota scowls. “I’m not trying to _force_ anything, I just want to— wait.” He glances from Franz to Nonomiya in question. “Is that not why he’s here?”

“God, no!” Nonomiya quickly shakes his head. “He may be here because of you, but I only got _some_ of your bad luck, not all of it, thank you very much.” 

“Because of me..?”

“I found him,” he jerks a thumb at Franz, “off his ass in the entertainment district. _Normally,_ I would have just left him, so screw you and your help-thy-neighbour values.”

“I bit some drunk girl at a club who was into it,” Franz smiles around his chopsticks. “A good time all around.”

“He’s been staying with you since?”

“No, he has _not._ ”

“I haven’t been staying anywhere else, though,” the vampire grins a little wider, teeth bright. 

“You don’t even need to when sleep is a choice—” Nonomiya lets out a frustrated growl. “This isn’t the point. The point of this conversation is to get Seo to stop moping—”

“Oi.”

“—over his runaway, so hurry up and _help_ him already.”

Franz doesn’t answer, taking a liberal amount of time to chug the last of his noodles. When he finally puts the cup down to see both of them staring at him expectantly, he pouts. “I already said no. Aren’t we off this topic, already?”

Kota clenches a fist, keeping hold on his temper. “No, we’re not.” 

The vampire rolls his eyes.

Slamming a hand on the table, “ _listen_ to me. Injury aside, Reo wasn’t fully okay last I saw. I need to talk to him.”

“Easy, Seo,” murmurs Nonomiya.

“You don’t _need_ to do anything.” Franz looks at him disdainfully, mouth pulling down into a frown for the first time. “He’s in possession of all his entrails, he’ll be fine. Eventually. Seeing you would just put him in the same state he was before getting stabbed.

“I don’t like it,” he presses on, expression growing darker. “I hate it, actually. He manages to keep himself alive for— how many years? Just to throw it out the window after driving himself to depression staying with you. You may have been important to him, but _I_ ,” he pronounces very sharply. “don’t think you’re worth it.”

 _Driving himself to depression._ Was that really all it was?

“Franz,” Nonomiya hisses the start of a reproach, “that’s—”

“Wrong,” Kota fills in. “You’re wrong.”

Franz tilts his head in a mocking question, and Kota tries. To push, remember the parts of the night that Reo left that weren’t just his own desperation, the parts of their time together when he wasn’t struck by the distant look in the other’s eyes. 

It’s much easier than he expects.

“He said he felt guilty. I didn’t know why the first time round, but I can fix that this time—there doesn’t need to be a secret. And he was scared.” Kota’s mouth twists; he can understand it, that fear. “I can fix that too.”

“Do you realise how juvenile you sound?” Franz scoffs, crossing his arms.

“He was happy,” Kota insists. “It wasn’t just _being_ there that was messing with him. And if it was, then I won’t know if I don’t ask, and I’m not stupid enough not to back off if he says yes.”

“Really,” says Franz, voice flat, but the uncertain look on Nonomiya’s face softens at that. 

“I can figure out ways to make it safer seeing as I know there’s a danger now. Maybe he won’t be able to run as easily as he can on his own but,” Kota pauses, and it’s here that’s the issue, isn’t it? Reo will be throwing away the safety of routine, but he has to assume he can make him happy enough to balance it out. 

He _can_ make him happy enough to balance it out. 

Nonomiya must understand, because he nods and looks to Franz, but the latter is unmoved. Before he can brush him off again, Kota risks a gamble. 

“You don’t understand, and you don’t think it’s worth it.” he states first, and who could blame Franz, really, if he truly has been hopping locations and drinking in small doses just to stay off the radar. Kota didn’t find any trouble living alone and refusing to confide in his only friend, until...

“But I think you tried, at least a little, for Reo,” he pauses, inwardly praying he hasn’t read this all wrong, that he doesn’t set this conversation back to zero, “I think you’re still trying, and that... maybe you’re starting to figure it out.”

And very, very deliberately, he flicks a glance to Nonomiya. 

Franz’s eyes narrow sharply. Nonomiya, having missed it, looks between them in confusion.

“That’s a bold assumption to make.”

Maybe so, Kota thinks, but he can’t think of another explanation for all this. He doesn’t reply, waiting, waiting—

“Fine.”

Nonomiya blinks. “What?”

Franz sighs, dropping his cheek on to his propped knuckles. “I said, fine.”

“Thank you.” All of the tension in Kota’s body rushes out like a punctured balloon, and he slumps against the weight of the relief that remains. “ _Thank you,_ I—”

“He won’t come anywhere near your place, so you’ll go where I say with no complaints. And if you don’t leave when you’re told, I have full rights to gut and eat you.”

“Okay,” Kota agrees even as Nonomiya protests ( _“Franz!”_ ), heart thumping in anticipation. “That’s fine. Anything’s fine.”

Franz looks away, expression going bored again. “That’s a stupid thing to say.”

“It’s not.” Finally, finally, Kota relaxes enough that he can smile. “I just need to tell him everything straight. Ask him to believe in me.” Just enough for a chance.

Nonomiya’s squinting at him for a long moment, before he suddenly startles, like he’s realised something. “Hey, Seo, you… Towards him, you don’t, um, feel…?”

“What?”

His friend opens his mouth, jaw working for a second in hesitation,and surprisingly, it seems to put Franz in a good mood again, smirk widening.

“Yeah, Nonomiya, what?” he snickers. “What _does_ he feel?”

Nonomiya stares at them both for a long time, expression sinking into… despair? Before he finally gives up and drops his head back into his hands again. “Okay, yeah, nope. Never mind.”

“What is it?” Kota presses, concerned.

“ _No,_ ” he groans. “I’m not fucking dealing with this.”

“Nonomiya—”

“—is going to get himself a nice, strong drink, thanks.” He waves a hand between them, the other one going to knead his temples. “You guys can figure out the rest of the details. Just… no.”

Franz bursts into proper laughter, letting it ring out through the small apartment for the first time that evening, and the sound might’ve been nice if Kota were any less confused.

“Seriously, what?” he turns to the vampire in front of him. 

“Nothing, nothing,” Franz gets out through guffaws, sounding profoundly unconvincing. 

But then he taps the table and says, “here’s how this is going to happen,” and Kota can’t care about anything else. He listens to every word out of his mouth with care, even takes out his phone to program it in, only spares Nonomiya a glance when the other knocks back a shot like water. All the while, he can barely keep the giddy smile off his face.

He’s gonna bring Reo home. 

Reo’s coming _home._

**Author's Note:**

> Things I wanted to put in but couldn't bc Kota didn't ask:  
> \- Franz saying "feels gross" describes what it might be like to eat a tiered cheesecake while critically lactose intolerant. Reo is totally justified in hating food, Kota's being overdramatic.  
> \- The three ramen-cups are the bribe Nonomiya used to get Franz in his apartment at a specific time, rather than showing up whenever and scaring the shit out of him.  
> \- Franz feeds in the red-light district bc he can find a lot of people who are into that kind of thing and also bc it keeps him off the Holy Cult's radar. Also, everyone he drinks from is usually boozed up, so it's fun.
> 
> Thank you guys for reading! I got weirdly invested in this play and wanted to write some memes and give Kota a shot at a happy ending. Please leave me a comment if you enjoyed :D


End file.
